


Game Over

by floweryhanzo



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Character Death, Gen, In-Game Universe, Overwatch - Freeform, Series, Shimada Brothers, Temple of Anubis
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-24
Updated: 2017-09-24
Packaged: 2019-01-04 23:55:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12178971
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/floweryhanzo/pseuds/floweryhanzo
Summary: A series of oneshots set in the game's universe rather than the lore's universe, featuring stories based on things that happened (to me, probably) in-game.





	Game Over

**Author's Note:**

> One day, and I promise I wasn't more drunk or sleep-deprived than usual, I realised that the characters who are trapped inside the nightmarish purgatory that is the Overwatch game go through a lot of things that'd make really good stories. I also thought it'd be hilarious to, you know, write about all the completely unrealistic and nonsensical things that exist in the game as if they were perfectly normal, plausible and as expected. Just a word of caution, however: these are not crackfics. They take themselves very seriously, in fact.
> 
> It took me five seconds to list ten specific in-game scenes I wanted to write into stories, but approximately five centuries to actually start doing it - today, finally, I can upload the first story on that list here.
> 
> Tags, characters and so on and so on to follow in another five centuries when I actually add more stories into this. Meanwhile... enjoy, or otherwise.

* * *

 

Despite the truck’s size, it’s travelling over the desert in a smoother fashion than Hanzo would have expected. It isn’t the first time he’s taking a trip through the arid landscape that way, but the vehicles he’s been in before have hardly given him a pleasant time. With his tea splashing around inside his only partially filled mug, he’s not sure whether to give this journey the title of _pleasant_ either, but at least it’s not as bad as the previous one he took part in. Seated beside him sits Amari Ana, a woman in her sixties, with a steaming mug of her own. It gives out a sweet fragrance that contrasts with the duller, earthier scent of Hanzo’s green tea. It’s an Egyptian tea, sweet and rich, the scent of spices like ginger wafting from it impossible to ignore.

”So, you are an archer, then,” Ana says, her eyes upon the pages of a newspaper that Hanzo can’t read.

”I am.”

”Why choose such an archaic weapon?”

”Why choose a rifle?”

Slowly, she lifts her gaze and examines him with her good eye. Then she chuckles.  
”Fair enough. I chose my weapon because of my proficiency with it, but also because I liked the way it felt - it is perfectly balanced for me, the perfect weight and size.”

”Like an extension of yourself,” Hanzo finishes for her, and she nods.

For a while, they’re quiet against the background’s whirring and rumbling and the rhythmic knocks of objects against the reinforced walls of the truck’s interior. A quiet murmur reaches Hanzo’s ears from a different corner where others of the strike team are conversing, but the words get lost in the noise.

”To be honest with you,” Ana continues then, turning the page of her paper as if the matter hardly concerns her, ”I do not like the way this looks. There is only one entrance through the marketplace and it is a bottleneck if I ever saw one. We will get through, I have no doubt of it, but I expect that we will suffer some losses - perhaps fatal ones rather than something we can patch up later and carry on.”

”As long as we reach the objective,” Hanzo replies dryly and sips his tea.  
His other hand’s index finger trails up the spine of his bow where the weapon rests lightly against his side.

”Are you afraid to die, archer?”

”No.”

”Neither am I. You are an old soul, for such a young man. I feel for you.”

 

* * *

 

They step outside into the scorching heat. Hanzo feels a steady battering of sharp grains of sand against his exposed arm and tilts his head against the wind, nostrils flaring, as his eyes take to the form of the ancient stone structures walling in the city ahead. He spots no defenses upon them - no hidden snipers taking aim for them and no automated weapons staring down their path. He can feel the wetness of his palm against the grip of his bow already. It doesn’t matter; the material won’t allow his hand to slip, no matter what.

”Move in along the buildings. We push through the gates together. Hanzo, stay behind; there is a platform ahead, make sure that anything upon it is destroyed to ensure us a safe passage along the street below it,” Ana’s voice carries more through the communications link than over the physical distance between them.

Roadhog grunts. He throws his head to the side, rubs at his neck and motions them onwards, taking the lead. The group quickly makes its way into the shade of the building ahead, but as the rest of them move to gather at the wall, Hanzo jumps and takes a hold of it instead, bringing himself up and over its top with ease. He dives behind the large, stone-carved well and takes a breath before glancing around.

”The enemy is here,” he speaks to the communications, pulling his head back behind the structure, ”They hold the bottleneck behind the gates. I can take down two, but you will have to deal with the defensive front first.”

”Acknowledged. Can you spot a medic?”

Hanzo’s eyes gaze at the deep blue sky above. The heat of the sun is scorching against his bare skin and heavy and warm against the fabric of his clothes as it stares down at him from the heavens above.

”Valkyrie,” he recalls from memory.

Ana curses under her breath.  
”Ziegler will outheal me. We have to make this a quick one, or we lose the war of attrition. Hold.”

A silence.

”Push.”

The scenery explodes. Hanzo grabs a hold of the well and balances to its top, weapon at aim. The first arrow strikes past the front of the defenses, clipping a repositioning man in his arm and sending his body sideways against the wall of the platform. Without thinking, Hanzo sends another arrow at him. It pierces through the side of his head, pinning his corpse to the bricks behind him. Past the body, the white and gold shape of Doctor Angela Ziegler charges onto the platform and disappears behind a sturdy stone pillar; Hanzo’s balance sways as he tries to find an angle from which to get at her, but she’s completely obscured by the environment, and he gives in soon enough, seeking another target for his shot.

He fires two arrows into the front as his allies keep pushing through it, killing no one but causing enough injury to send them backing up the street. A flash of white and gold appears and then vanishes from view again on the platform, but despite remaining in cover, the bright beam from Ziegler’s technology covers her team, the trickle of blood from their various wounds reducing to nothing before Hanzo’s eyes. He takes another deep breath and hops down from the well, repositioning behind his team at the gates to look for an angle through which he could reliably land a shot at her. Then, as his allies pass around a corner to enter the market square, she steps out of her cover. For a fleeting second, Hanzo has the perfect shot: he draws back the arrow, eyes sharp as he marks the spot between her shoulders, and releases.

At that moment, something white flashes across the platform. Hanzo barely has the time to gasp as the cyborg repositions himself between the arrow and the medic, his blade drawn, and in the fraction of a moment that passes between the flash of metal against the parching sun and the soft, defeated chuckle that ends the gasp escaping Hanzo’s mouth, he feels as if he’s lived a lifetime trapped in the scene.

Despite the sound of fighting - of explosions - around him, Hanzo can distinctively hear the silent sound of impact between the sharp head of his arrow and the katana deflecting it. It changes course, bouncing directly back at him at a slight angle. He draws breath again, his body moving to the side even though he knows it makes no difference; the arrow makes contact with him, buries itself midway through his gut and stops. A choked sound makes its way through his communications link, but no one on the other end catches it. As his knees hit the dry, dusty ground, he reaches out to close the link.

They’ll find him later - once the task is complete. There’s no need to distract them before then.

Ziegler vanishes from sight, and Hanzo doubts she has any idea how close to death she just came. The cyborg on the platform stands still for a moment, his masked face unreadable, but then he turns and vanishes from sight just the same. Hanzo, his breath unsteady and choked, lands his palm against the ground and pulls himself back until he’s past the gates on the outside. There he lands his back against the warm tiles of the wall and closes his eyes, hand pressing over the throbbing heat surrounding the shaft of the arrow sticking out of him. It blocks most of the bleeding but it makes no difference - the bloodloss is not the reason he’s already dead, it’s the fact that the arrow’s pierced his organs, releasing the acid from his stomach and the bacteria from his intestines into his body.

The scenery blurs slowly. Just as sluggishly the heat of the day starts fading into a creeping chill; warmth escapes Hanzo’s fingertips first, then his nose, his ears, his shoulders and arms. He shakes violently against the stone as the pain in his stomach intensifies, but there’s nothing he can do, so he closes his eyes and concentrates on breathing - on being alive, for this one last time. It’s a curious sensation.

The fight in the background moves forwards, along the second street towards the temple. Hanzo hears it fading, the shouts and the gunshots turning to wind crossing through the wide desert surrounding him. Then, there’s a sound of footsteps approaching him - soft and silent and unhurried against the paved street behind him. He opens his eyes again when a shadow covers the blinding light of the sun ahead of him, and he sees the cyborg standing before him for a moment until he kneels down next to him instead.

”Have you lost your aim, Genji?” Hanzo breathes out, his voice broken and shaky but tinted with the smile on his lips, ”That shot was perfectly aligned for my head, and yet you still missed.”

”I admit that deflect was not a highlight for me, but it did save my medic.”

Hanzo nods, his eyes closing again. When he draws in air, he can feel fluid in his throat and the breath rasps on its way out. He doesn’t struggle when Genji takes a hold of his shoulder and pulls him off the wall, but he can feel his world swaying and every single turn of his body like a punch or a fall against a hard surface when the cyborg pulls him against his metallic frame instead, leaving him collapsed in his lap, the back of his head against Genji’s shoulder and his bleeding, shaking body over his plated stomach and between his relaxed legs. When he opens his eyes again, the sun is nothing but a white blur in the pale, foggy-looking sky, and the structures and the desert around him are fading into a uniform mist, but Genji’s arm as it wraps around his chest and holds him steady against his body is still solid and real to him despite the disconnect between his fading life and the dying flesh that rejects it.

”So... this is how it ends,” Genji speaks quietly against the side of Hanzo’s head.  
His fingers reach in to undo the sash around Hanzo’s hair, letting it fall down and over his ears and neck.  
”Forgive me for being the cause of it, brother.”

”Did you not forgive me for the same crime once?” Hanzo lets out, his chuckle drowning into a bubble of blood and slime climbing up his throat.

Genji nods; his mask rubs against Hanzo’s head.

”What will you do with it?” Hanzo asks him, his fingers unsteadily making a gesture towards the sash still in Genji’s grip.

”I will keep it with me, so that you will stay with me, too.”

The silence turns to a white noise inside Hanzo’s ears, and for a while, he can’t distinguish between the world around him and the sensation of his consciousness falling apart within his flesh. The hold of Genji’s arm around his body and the firmness of his frame behind him stay for some time, but even those things become steadily less apparent, less physical, as the fatigue taking over Hanzo starts tuning off the weakening signals from the non-crucial nerves in his body. The pain in him turns to a distant throbbing: it becomes all that he can feel, and his thoughts bounce from decades ago to this very moment in a fractioned, yet apparently seamless, manner in which his whole life is nothing but a continuum of presence.

”I loved you,” he hears his own voice say although his ears barely perceive the sound any longer, ”Always.”

”I know this. I hope you know that it was never one-sided, even when I was too stupid to be there for you. At least... I am happy that I can be here now, Hanzo. I will not leave your side.”

”Like I left yours.”

”It is forgiven, brother. Rest now. We will meet again in a different life.”


End file.
